1. "By almost any standard, Missouri v. Jenkins, the Kansas City, Missouri, school desegregation case, was extraordinary. Between 1985 and 2003 federal judges ordered more than $2 billion in new spending by the school district to encourage desegregation.

2. Not only did they double property taxes to pay this huge bill, but they imposed an income tax surcharge on everyone who lived or worked in the city.

3. The court order turned every high school and middle school (as well as half the elementary schools) into "magnet schools," each with a distinctive themeincluding not merely science, performing arts, and computer studies, but also classical Greek, Asian studies, agribusiness, and environmental studies. The newly constructed classical Greek high school housed an Olympic-sized pool with an underwater observation room, an indoor track, a gymnastic center, and racquetball courts.

4. The former coach of the Soviet Olympic fencing team was hired to teach inner-city students how to thrust and parry. The school system spent almost a million dollars a year to recruit white kids from the suburbs, and even hired door-to-door taxi service for them.

5. By 1995 Kansas City was spending over $10,000 per student, more than any comparable school system in the country.

6. Despite this massive effort, litigation failed either to improve the quality of education or to reduce racial isolation. Test scores continued to drop, and the percentage of minority students continued to rise.

1. "By almost any standard, Missouri v. Jenkins, the Kansas City, Missouri, school desegregation case, was extraordinary. Between 1985 and 2003 federal judges ordered more than $2 billion in new spending by the school district to encourage desegregation.

2. Not only did they double property taxes to pay this huge bill, but they imposed an income tax surcharge on everyone who lived or worked in the city.

3. The court order turned every high school and middle school (as well as half the elementary schools) into "magnet schools," each with a distinctive themeincluding not merely science, performing arts, and computer studies, but also classical Greek, Asian studies, agribusiness, and environmental studies. The newly constructed classical Greek high school housed an Olympic-sized pool with an underwater observation room, an indoor track, a gymnastic center, and racquetball courts.

4. The former coach of the Soviet Olympic fencing team was hired to teach inner-city students how to thrust and parry. The school system spent almost a million dollars a year to recruit white kids from the suburbs, and even hired door-to-door taxi service for them.

5. By 1995 Kansas City was spending over $10,000 per student, more than any comparable school system in the country.

6. Despite this massive effort, litigation failed either to improve the quality of education or to reduce racial isolation. Test scores continued to drop, and the percentage of minority students continued to rise.

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